Tag: poems

Ithaka

When you set out for Ithaka
ask that your way be long,
full of adventure, full of instruction.
The Laistrygonians and the Cyclops,
angry Poseidon – do not fear them:
such as these you will never find
as long as your thought is lofty, as long as a rare
emotion touch your spirit and your body.
The Laistrygonians and the Cyclops,
angry Poseidon – you will not meet them
unless you carry them in your soul,
unless your soul raise them up before you.

Ask that your way be long.
At many a Summer dawn to enter
with what gratitude, what joy –
ports seen for the first time;
to stop at Phoenician trading centres,
and to buy good merchandise,
mother of pearl and coral, amber and ebony,
and sensuous perfumes of every kind,
sensuous perfumes as lavishly as you can;
to visit many Egyptian cities,
to gather stores of knowledge from the learned.

Have Ithaka always in your mind.
Your arrival there is what you are destined for.
But don’t in the least hurry the journey.
Better it last for years,
so that when you reach the island you are old,
rich with all you have gained on the way,
not expecting Ithaka to give you wealth.
Ithaka gave you a splendid journey.
Without her you would not have set out.
She hasn’t anything else to give you.

And if you find her poor, Ithaka hasn’t deceived you.
So wise you have become, of such experience,
that already you’ll have understood what these Ithakas mean.

Constantine P. Cavafy
1911

In the Spring
running water,
skimming over rocks,
through the trees,
in the spring,
when melting snow, 
leaves no trace,
like it was never there,
but for the rushing water,
the crumbling trails,
under a new sun,
a new time,
in the descending forest.

like a leaf
floating downriver.
we follow the trail of time,
through shadows in the night
to the rising island sun,
to the golden meadows:
we laugh with the tides,
we race with the moon,
we sing with the fading light.

Joy

bringing joy in a bucket
by the barn
near the meadow
filled and warmed by the sun
untouched by dark clouds
protected for another day

Memories

memories are like
melting icicles
on a barn in Vermont,
colored red
on a country road
where the deer run 
near the beaver ponds,
as the years slip by 
and the seasons change,
like a clock in motion
a sundial at work
in the time of our lives.